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Viewing: Blog Posts Tagged with: grass angels, Most Recent at Top [Help]
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1. Lesson Learned from the Little Guys

Handsome Boy plays T-Ball. So, two (and sometimes three) days a week, we load the trunk with folding Penn State chairs, water bottles, a Steelers bat, a pint-sized ball glove, and set off for the t-ball fields. We sit. We watch. We cheer. We swat bugs. Each game is pretty much like the one before. 


Until last night. 

Last night, somewhere amid the sitting and the bug-swatting and the game-watching and the cheering, I unexpectedly learned something from these small-type ball players... 

After dropping off the Boy at his dugout, Lovely Girl and I set up our chairs and settled in to watch my little man do his stuff. I squinted through the bright sun at Handsome Boy out in the field as he examined dirt, made grass angels in the outfield, watched several batted balls roll right past him, yukked it up with his cap pulled completely over his face, and played pretend-catch with another outfielder. I cringed as he played tag and climbed the fence in the dugout. In fact, I spent the whole first inning trying to get his attention from the sidelines, sending desperate hand-signals to get him to get in the game before he got a t-ball upside the head (like last game). 

Then, somewhere in the middle of my worries about Handsome Boy receiving his next bonk on the head, I stopped obsessing about my youngest child and took a look around at his teammates. Several little guys preferred to have a seat in the dirt as they waited for the batter to connect with the ball. A few ran in little circles in their assigned spots. Still others deposited unknown treasures from the ground into their pockets.  There were some wrestlers in the outfield. A couple teammates intently searched the outfield grass for interesting critters to scrutinize. And they all played tag and climbed the fence in the dugout.

Then I started to just relax and watch the game. When the other team hit a grounder to center field, our center fielder's frustrated dad pleaded with his daughter to put down the lovely butterfly she'd just found, and go get the ball. In the next inning, while our batter was still swinging, their first baseman ran gleefully to the sidelines, clutching something thin and gray in his little fist. "Mommy! I found a feather for you!" A while later, Butterfly Girl waved her newest find at her dad as he once again begged her to put down the pretty butterfly and pick up the ball that had just rolled past her.

In between, there were some great plays: a couple of awesome hits to the outfield, a few pop-flies, some great plays at first base, and some exciting chase scenes as our right-fielder barreled toward home plate to tag a runner out.

But the best moment of all was right near the end of the game. Our team was fielding. The other team smacked a sky-high pop-fly right toward center field. But this time, Butterfly Girl was ready. She caught that ball in the air, then looked with amazement first at her glove, then at her coach - who ran over to give her a double high-five, then over at her dad. Then her grin stretched a mile wide as she took in the whistles, claps and cheers from both sides - coaches and parents alike - all for her fantastic catch.

At the end of the game, there were giant smiles on every kid's face. Nobody noticed how many outs there were, or how many runs were scored. Nobody argued about who collected pebbles in the infield, and who paid attention the whole time. Everybody thought their team had won, and every kid out there had a great time.

A few grass angels left in the outfield, and a few butterflies caught, and a few birds missing a feather or two is all part of the fun, I realized...

...and I'm so glad I didn't miss it.




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2. The Andy Warhol Dr. Seuss Clown Cubicle: How To Revise Your Humorous Book

"This is about taking the crazy cat person's enthusiastic aesthetic...you should do something very cool and totally overwhelming with your cube space. Make it the biggest something--whatever it s that you're into: stars, Bollywood, Charles Bukowski, UFOs, Sophia Loren, Dr. Seuss, surfing, Andy Warhol, knitting, Nikola Tesla, fancy hats, expensive boots, clowns."

That's Jeffrey Yamaguchi describing the most obsessive, anti-social ways to decorate your cubicle in his new book, Working For The Man. This week he released a series of office-related videos for the handbook, including this cringe-inducing feature :

Yamaguchi's book teaches creative types around the corporate world how escape the mind-numbing monotony of a dayjob. This week he's our special guest on my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions.

In the spirit of Jack Nicholson's mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality interviews with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
I'm sure this kind of book requires a special kind of revision. I'm sure your first draft had a much lower joke and comic ratio than the final product How did you revise your first draft into the hilarious final product? How did you add the layers of jokes and cartoons on top of your original draft?

Jeffrey Yamaguchi:
The humor, I don’t know – there were not painstaking revisions to the jokes. I think maybe because this book was written in pieces over many years, that probably helped. Continue reading...

 

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3. How To Outline A Humorous Book: Jeffrey Yamaguchi Breaks It Down

There are writing handbooks for almost everything--novels, short stories, memoirs, etc.; but as far as I know, nobody has ever explained how to write a humorous book.

Reading Jeffrey Yamaguchi's mocking look at corporate working environments, Working For The Man, I saw the rare opportunity to find out how to write a humorous book. 

Yamaguchi runs the happy-go-lucky blog, 52 Projects, highlighting crafty projects on the web, including the community memory archive at StoryCorps, his own writer-centric Influences Project, and the creative writing MFA Handbook.

Today,
he's our special guest on my deceptively simple feature, Five Easy Questions--teaching us how to outline a long-form humor book without going crazy.

In the spirit of Jack Nicholson's mad piano player, I run a weekly set of quality interviews with writing pioneers—delivering some practical, unexpected advice about web writing.

Jason Boog:
How in the heck did you outline this book? It's a handbook, there's no plot, no solid characters (except your writing personality). Any advice for a writer looking to outline and write this kind of humorous handbook? Who are the writers we can read for inspiration in this genre of Humorous Handbooks?

Jeffrey Yamaguchi:
Outlining on paper was not too hard, but once all the material was written, actually organizing the material in this book was very difficult. Continue reading...

 

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